Not My Mother

I am drawn to this portrait because the woman in it resembles my mother. I imagine she was interesting to my father for the same reason. It is also curious to note that the face looks somewhat detached from the hair, almost as if it is a mask behind held by the hand. I suppose one could write a whole story about this. I wonder what a Polish artist would do with this?

I have seen many terrific Polish posters done for plays and films that exploit such visual ambiguities to bring out a duality of meaning. Masks and faces are very popular for this reason. This one could represent a man's wishful construct of a woman that wasn't really there. I suspect if this were indeed done more fully as a painting exploring these ideas, that a hint of my father's own face could be peeking out from behind the mask...

5 x 7, graphite on paper.